World Cruise - Day 58 - Mar 10 - Iwo Jima

I didn’t know whether to title this date “At Sea” or “Iwo Jima”—or maybe best would be a little of both.  We are at sea all day, but we are doing “scenic cruising” by Iwo Jima from 11a-2p today.  Here are a couple of sunrise photos, one pre-sunrise and one just after sunrise:

I like the way the sun was lighting up the low lying clouds in the sky.

…then when the sun started to rise above the low lying clouds, the colors of the sky turned the rest of the sky into shades of yellow and orange.  Beautiful.  It looks like it will be a pretty day forecast is for 72 degrees.  This will likely be our last warm day until Mar 20 (10 days from now) when we are in Hong Kong.  Forecast for Tokyo, Hiroshima, Busan and Shanghai are all high 40s, so quite a bit cooler than we have had recently.  Someone mentioned that there was snow recently in Tokyo, although that probably is at the higher elevations outside the city?

We passed by this island during breakfast:

I didn’t quite catch the name when it was announced by the captain of the bridge.  Apparently there have been several volcanic eruptions in this area over the last century, several of which have produced islands that later sank into the sea just below sea level, making them a new hazard for shipping, since they aren’t on previous maps.  Here is a pic of Krissie on the back of the ship with the island in the background:

Iwo Jima is south of the Japanese mainland and was a key island during WWII with a battle there where approximately 8,000 Marines lost their lives.  Mount Suribachi is an extinct volcano that rises 400 feet above sea level and is best known for this iconic photograph of the Marines raising the flag there in WWII:

The raising of the flag was taken by Joe Rosenthal on February 23, 1945.  It is one of the most iconic photographs of the 20^th century.  And it was on the top of Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima:

You can see most of the island stretching out behind Mount Suribachi.  To the left of Mount Suribachi there is a beach where many of the Marines landed and many of their landing craft still remain:

There were about 12-15 different ships wrecked on the beach and rusting there for the last 67 years.  This wrecked ship looks like it is still smoking, but that is the plume from the semi-active volcano on the island:

Krissie went up to the top deck to get a better view of the island:

You can see how far Iwo Jima stretches in addition to Mount Suribachi.  There is a rock at the other end of the island that they referred to as the breaching whale:

…and shortly thereafter, I saw what looked like a breaching whale in the water nearby.  I thought it was just a rock causing the water to splash over it, but then I snapped this pic:

…and knew that it was a real whale.  I’m pretty good at getting tails, not as good at getting a breach.  So I waited for awhile with my camera fully zoomed at 300mm and was able to get this shot of a whale coming up out o the water:

A little bit blurry, but that’s by far my best photo of a whale actually breaching.  Then we were distracted by some of the jets overhead:

Then there was another plane, this one a four prop cargo plane:

…that went almost directly overhead.  A little bit eerie, given all of the warfare that has taken place on Iwo Jima.  Our choir sang a song during the remembrance ceremony (The Lord’s Prayer):

Then some of the vets through a weath:

…into the water in honor of the war dead:

In the afternoon, we watched a sermon video from Peter Eddington on Marriage Covenant and Spiritual Recommitment given last year during Days of Unleavened Bread.

Julie, we passed the temperature checks.  Krissie and I both had 96 point something (even though 98.6 is normal).  I didn’t hear them call out any high temps while we were in line.  I’m not exactly sure what they would do if someone was running a fever?  Today we found out that we will also have to be fingerprinted before getting off in Japan.  Security seems to be running pretty high in the countries where we are going.

Entertainment tonight was Bayne Bacon, a singer and comedian, if there is such a combination:

He was pretty funny.  He’s from Texas and has a Texas drawl, yet he played some great Andrew Lloyd Webber pieces on the piano:

…and played some guitar:

…and told some jokes.  Good combination of music and humor.  We are looking forward to seeing him again in a few evenings.

Tomorrow is sea day #3 (if we count today as a sea day) of 3 on our way to Tokyo on Monday.